ABC Etymological Dictionary of Old Chinese (ABC Chinese Dictionary Series)ABC ETYMOLOGICAL
DICTIONARY OF
OLD CHINESE
Axel Schuessler
This is the first genuine etymological dictionary of Old Chinese written in any language. As such, it constitutes a milestone in research on the evolution of the Sinitic language group. Whereas previous studies have emphasized the structure of the Chinese characters, this pathbreaking dictionary places primary emphasis on the sounds and meanings of Sinitic roots. Based on more than three decades of intensive investigation in primary and secondary sources, this completely new dictionary places Old Chinese squarely within the Sino-Tibetan language family (includ- ing close consideration of numerous Tiberto-Burman languages), while paying due regard to other language families such as Austroasiatic, Miao-Yao (Hmong-Mien), and Kam-Tai.
Designed for use by nonspecialists and specialists alike, the dictionary is highly accessible, being arranged in alphabeti- cal order and possessed of numerous innovative lexicographical features. Each entry offers one or more possible etymologies as well as reconstructed pronunciations and other relevant data. Words that are morphologically re- lated are grouped together into “word families” that attempt to make explicit the derivational or other etymological processes that relate them. The diction- ary is preceded by a substantive and significant introduction that outlines the author’s views on the linguistic position of Chinese within Asia and
(Continued on back flap)
(Continued from front flap)
details the phonological and morpho- logical properties, to the degree they are known, of the earliest stages of the Chinese language and its ancestor. This introduction, because it both summa- ries and synthesizes earlier work and makes several original contributions, functions as a useful reference work all on its own.
The ABC Etymological Dictionary of Old Chinese is a monumental achieve- ment in the history of Chinese linguis- tics, offering many new hypotheses and systematically evaluating and incorpo- rating earlier scholarship. It will be warmly welcomed by scholars in a wide variety of China- and Asia-related fields, including early Chinese language, literature, culture, and thought as well as the broader cultural-linguistic landscape of prehistorical East and Southeast Asia.
Axel Schuessler is emeritus pro- fessor at Wartburg College, Iowa.
Chinese language and linguistics
A Handbook of ‘Phags-pa Chinese W. South Coblin
2006, 325 pages Cloth ISBN 978-0-8248-3000-7
‘Phags-pa Chinese is the earliest form of the Chinese language to be written in a systematically devised alphabetic script. It is named after its creator, a brilliant thirteenth-century Tibetan scholar-monk who also served as political adviser to Kublai Khan. ‘Phags-pa’s invention of an alphabet for the Mongolian language remains an extraordinarily important accomplishment, both conceptually and practically. With it he achieved nothing less than the creation of a unified script for all of the numerous peoples in the Mongolian empire, including the Central Asian Turks and Sinitic-speaking Chinese. The language is of immense importance for the study of premodern Chinese phonology. However, the script is difficult to read and interpret, and secondary materials on it are scattered and not easily obtained. The present book is intended as a practical introduction to ‘Phags-pa Chinese studies and a guide for reading and interpreting the script.
ABC Chinese-English Comprehensive Dictionary Edited by John DeFrancis
2003, 1,464 pages Cloth ISBN 978-0-8248-2766-3
“Excellent. . . . An outstanding contribution to the field, in many ways better than other comparable dictionaries.” —China Review International
Jacket design by Santos Barbasa Jr.
University of Hawai‘i Press Honolulu, Hawai‘i 96822-1888
www.uhpress.hawaii.edu
ABC CHINESE DICTIONARY SERIES
Victor H. Mair, General Editor
The ABC Chinese Dictionary Series aims to provide a complete set of convenient and reliable reference tools for all those who need to deal with Chinese words and characters. A unique feature of the series is the adoption of a strict alphabetical order, the fastest and most user-friendly way to look up words in a Chinese dictionary. Most volumes contain graphically oriented indices to assist in finding characters whose pronunciation is not known. The ABC dictionaries and compilations rely on the best expertise available in China and North America and are based on the application of radically new strategies for the study of Sinitic languages and the Chinese writing system, including the first clear distinction between the etymology of the words, on the one hand, and the evolution of shapes, sounds, and meanings of char­ acters, on the other. While aiming for conciseness and accuracy, series volumes also strive to apply the highest standards of lexicography in all respects, including compatibility with computer technology for information processing.
Other titles in the series
ABC Chinese-English Dictionary (desk reference and pocket editions)
Edited by John DeFrancis
ABC Chinese-English Comprehensive Dictionary
Edited by John DeFrancis
A Handbook of'Phags-pa Chinese
Axel Schuessler
SYMBOLS AND ABBREVIATIONS ........................................................................ xvii
1.1 1.1.1 1.2 1.2.1 1.2.2 1.2.3 1.2.4 1.2.5 1.2.6 1.2.7 1.2.8 J.3 1.3.1 1.4 1.4.1 1.4.2 1.4.3 1.4.4
2 2.1 2.1.1 2.1.2 2.1.3 2.2 2.3 2.3.1 2.3.2 2.4 2.4.1 2.4.2 2.4.3 2.4.4 2.5 2.5.1 2.6 2.6.1 2.6.2 2.7 2.8
OLD CHINESE AND ETyMOLOGy ........................................................... 1 Chinese .................................................................................................... 1 Sources of Old Chinese ............................................................................... 1 Old Chinese and its linguistic neighbors ........................................................ 1 Chinese and Sino-Tibetan ............................................................................ 2 Tibeto-Burnlan languages ............................................................................ 3 Miao-Yao .................................................................................................. 3 Tai-Kadai, Kam-Tai .................................................................................. 3 Austroasiatic ............................................................................................ 4 Vietnamese ............................................................................................... 4 "Northern" Austroasiatic ............................................................................ 5 Summary ................................................................................................. 5 Old Chinese dialects .................................................................................. 6 Rural dialects ............................................................................................ 7 The study of Old Chinese etymology ............................................................ 7 Approaches to word families and cognates .................................................... 8 Approaches to etymology through the graph .................................................. 9 Identification of cognates ............................................................................ 9 The present approach ................................................................................ 10
MORPHOLOGY AND WORD DERIVATION ........................................... 12 Grammatical relations in Old Chinese ......................................................... 12 "Vord order ..................................... , ....................................................... 12 Word class ............................................................................................. 12 Derivation and word class ......................................................................... 14 Types of derivations and allofams ............................................................. 14 Sino-Tibetan morphology ........................................................................... 15 The nature of Sino-Tibetan affixation ......................................................... 15 Sino-Tibetan morphemes ............................................................................ 16 Morphemes in Old Chinese ........................................................................ 17 Historical layers of morphemes in Old Chinese ........................................... 17 Suffixes in Old Chinese ............................................................................. 17 Sino-Tibetan prefixes in Old Chinese ........................................................... 18 Infixation ................................................................................................ 19 Parallel roots and stems ............................................................................ 20 Parallel stems of 'swell' ............................................................................ 20 Austroasiatic morphology in Old Chinese ................................................... 22 Austroasiatic infixes in Old Chinese ........................................................... 22 Austroasiatic word families in Old Chinese ................................................. 23 Expressives, reduplication ......................................................................... 24 Non-morphological word formation ............................................................ 25
v
CONTENTS
2.8.1 Re-analysis .............................................................................................. 25 2.8.2 Backformation, re-cutting ......................................................................... 25 2.8.3 Metathesis ............................................................................................... 26 2.8.4 Convergence ........................................................................................... 26 2.9 Meaning and sound ................................................................................... 27 2. 10 Semantic extension .................................................................................. 27
3 MC TONES AND THEIR OLD CHINESE EQUIVALENTS ........................ 29 3.1 Middle Chinese tone A (pfngsheng 4L~) ..................................................... 29 3.2 Middle Chinese tone B (shangsheng J:.~): phonology ..................................... 30 3.2.1 Tone B from Sino-Tibetan *-7 ..................................................................... 30 3.2.2 Tone B for Tibeto-Burman final *-k ........................................................... 31 3.2.3 ST *-7 in closed syllables ........................................................................... 32 3.2.4 Tone B for foreign final -I] ........................................................................ 32 3.3 Tone B as morpheme ................................................................................ 33 3.3.1 Tone B (1): terms for body parts and humans ............................................... 33 3.3.2 Tone B (2): co verbs and particles ............................................................... 34 3.3.3 Tone B (3): independent pronouns .............................................................. 34 3.4 Middle Chinese tone C (qusheng *~): phonology ......................................... 35 3.5 Tone C: later OC general purpose morpheme ................................................ 36
4 Tones B, C, and voicing: direction and diathesis ........................................... 38 4.1 Direction and diathesis ............................................................................ 38 4.1.1 Direction and diathesis in Old Chinese ........................................................ 40 4.2 Tone C (qusheng two morphological functions .................................... 41 4.2.1 The Sino-Tibetan sources of tone C ............................................................ 42 4.3 Tone C (1): exoactive derivation ................................................................. 42 4.3.1 Tone C: exoactive extrovert, ditransitive ............................................... 43 4.3.2 Tone C: exoactive transitive, causative I putative .................................... 44 4.3.3 Residue .................................................................................................. 45 4.4 Tone C (2): exopassive derivation ............................................................... 45 4.4.1 Exopassive as a transitive verb ................................................................... 46 4.5 Tone B (shfmgsheng l:~): endoactive derivation .......................................... 46 4.5.1 Tone B: endoactive nouns .......................................................................... 48 4.6 Voicing of the initial consonant: endopassive derivation ................................ 48 4.6.1 Residue ................................................................................................. 50
5 INITIAL CONSONANTS .......................................................................... 51 5.1 Devoiced initials ...................................................................................... 51 5. I. 1 Devoicing of ST initial *z-> Me s-............................................................ 51 5.2 Sino-Tibetan *s-prefix .............................................................................. 52 5.2.1 Causative s-prefix > Middle Chinese S- ........................................................ 52 5.2.2 Causative s-prefix > MC voiceless initial. .................................................... 52 5.2.3 Iterative s-prefix > MC S-, ~-, voiceless initial. ............................................ 53 5.2.4 Nouns with *8- > MC S-, voiceless initial. .................................................... 54 5.3 Devoicing and PTB *r-.............................................................................. 55 5.4 ST and PCII *k- ....................................................................................... 56 5.5 Other sources of devoicing ....................................................................... 56
VI
5.6 5.7 5.8 5.8.1 5.8.2 5.8.3 5.8.4 5.8.5 5.8.6 5.8.7 5.9 5.9.1 5.9.2 5.9.3 5.9.4 5.10 5.10.1 5.10.2 5.10.3 5.10.4 5.10.5 5.11 5.12 5.12.1 5.12.2 5.12.3
6 6.1 6.1.1 6.1.2 6.2 6.2.1 6.2.2 6.2.3 6.3 6.4 6.4.1 6.4.2 6.4.3 6.4.4 6.4.5 6.5 6.5.1 6.5.2 6.6 6.7 6.8 6.9
CONTENTS
MC initial x- from voiceless acute initials ................................................... 57 MC affricates from *s + stop consonant ..................................................... 58 Aspirated initial consonants ...................................................................... 58 MC aspiration: loss of ST pre-initial. .......................................................... 58 MC aspiration: causative .......................................................................... 59 MC aspiration: iterative ........................................................................... 59 MC aspiration: auxiliary verbs .................................................................. 60 Aspiration: outward and / or forceful motion .............................................. 60 Aspiration: hollow, empty ......................................................................... 61 Aspiration in foreign words ....................................................................... 61 Aspiration from PCH consonant clusters .................................................... 61 MC ts", from *k-s- and *s-7- ..................................................................... 61 MC tsh- from s + voiceless sonorant. .......................................................... 62 MC tshj- from OC clusters *k-hl-................................................................ 62 MC aspiration from other types of PCH initial clusters ................................. 63 Reflexes of Mon-Khmer affricates in Chinese ............................................. 63 MK c, j = MC affricates ........................................................................... 63 MK c, j = MC retroflex affricates .............................................................. 63 MK cr-, jr- = MC retroflex affricates ......................................................... 64 MK c, j = MC tsj-, tj-, etc. from OC *t(r)j- .............................................. 64 MK c, j = velar initials k, 9 ...................................................................... 65 MC 7- from foreign kl-type clusters ............................................................ 65 Nasal initials ........................................................................................... 65 I](W)- - nw- ............................................................................................ 65 Chinese m- for TB and foreign b- ............................................................... 65 Austroasiatic nasal infix ........................................................................... 67
FINAL CONSONANTS ............................................................................. 68 Final *-k ................................................................................................. 68 k-extension ............................................................................................ 69 Suffix -k: distributive ............................................................................... 70 Final -t ................................................................................................... 70 Nouns with final -t ................................................................................... 70 Final *(t)8 with grammatical words ...................................................... 72 Final -t foreign final -s ........................................................................... 72 Final -8 ................................................................................................... 72 Final-n .................................................................................................. 72 Final -in / -it .. , ........................................................................................ 72 Final *-un froln *-Ul] ................................................................................ 74 Nominalizing suffix -n ............................................................................. 74 Final -n with verbs .................................................................................... 75 Pronominal final -n .................................................................................. 76 Final -l) ................................................................................................... 76 Final -l) as a morpheme: terminative ........................................................... 76 Final -l) and open syllables ......................................................................... 76 Final stop consonant - nasal ...................................................................... 77 Dissimilation with labial finals -p / -m ...................................................... 77 OC final -i ............................................................................................ 78 Absence of final consonant after long vowel.. .............................................. 79
VII
CONTP.JTS
7 OLD CHINESE AND FOREIGN *r .......................................................... 80 7.1 OC *r as reflected in MC initial consonants ................................................ 80 7.1.1 MCinitiall- ............................................................................................ 80 7.1.2 OC voiceless *r-....................................................................................... 81 7.1.3 MC retroflex initials ................................................................................. 81 7.1.4 MC initial <;\j- and tj- ............................................................................... 81 7.1.5 MC d~- = foreign r- ................................................................................. 82 7.2 MC div. II, chOngniu div. III, and OC medial *-r- ....................................... 82 7.2.1 Foreign rnedial *r ..................................................................................... 83 7.2.2 Div. II = archaism ................................................................................... 83 7.3 MC 1- (OC *r-) foreign 1 ...................................................................... 83 7.4 OC medial *r and TB prefixes ................................................................... 84 7.5 OC medial *-r- as a morpheme: causative .................................................... 85 7.6 Residue ................................................................................................... 85 7.6.1 Foreign medial -r- = no trace in MC .......................................................... 85 7.6.2 OC medial *r no r in foreign word ......................................................... 85 7.7 Foreign final -r in OC / MC ...................................................................... 85 7.7.1 MC -n = foreign -1'. ................................................................................... 85 7.7.2 MC div. II or 3/3 +n final-relsewhere .................................................... 86 7.7.3 MC div. II = final -r elsewhere (metathesis) ................................................ 86 7.7.4 MCfinal-i for foreign *-r ........................................................................ 86 7.7.5 Foreign final r = open syllable .................................................................... 86
8 OLD CHINESE AND FOREIGN *1.. ......................................................... 88 8.1 OC initial *1- ........................................................................................... 88 8.1.1 MC d- and <;\j-, ~hj_ from OC L-series ........................................................... 88 8.1.2 MC zj- from PCH *s- before initial *1, *.1, *w ............................................ 89 8.1.3 MC dzj- (LHan z-) from OC *ml- .............................................................. 89 8.1.4 ST*n1--*s- ............................................................................................ 90 8.1.5 Pre-initial *m- in GSR 413 ~ ..................................................................... 90 8.2 Other initial clusters with I ........................................................................ 91 8.2.1 MC t- from foreign clusters with 1... ........................................................... 91 8.2.2 MC div. IIlV from foreign clusters with I. .................................................. 92 8.3 ST and foreign final -I in OC .................................................................... 92
9 9.1 9.1.1 9.1.2 9.1.3 9.1.4 9.2 9.2.1 9.3 9.4
10 10.1 10.1. 1
INITIAL AND MEDIAL J AND THE MC DIVISIONS ...................... 94 The MC divisions and medial j ................................................................... 94 Sources of div. IIIV ................................................................................. 95 Div. III vs. IIlV in word families .............................................................. 95 "Pure" div. IV ......................................................................................... 95 Sources of MC div. 11. .............................................................................. 95 Initial j- in OC ......................................................................................... 96 MC initial j- ~ 1- from OC *r-j-................................................................ 97 MC (LHan dz-) from ST initial *j- ........................................................ 98 MC zj- with OC *j- .................................................................................. 99
INITIAL AND MEDIAL *w ................................................................... 100 Initial *w- .............................................................................................. 100 Loss of *w ............................................................................................. 100
VIII
10.1.2 10.1.3 10.2 10.2.1 10.2.2 10.2.3
11 11. 1 11.1.1 11. \.2 11.1.3 ILI.4 11.1.5 11.2 11.2.1 11.2.2 11.3 11.3.1 11.3.2 11.3.3 11.3.4 11.3.5 11.4 11.5 11.5.1 11.5.2 11.6 11.7 11. 7.1 11.7.2 11.8 11.9 11.9.1 II. 9.2 11.9.3 11.10 11.10.1 11.10.2 11.10.3 11.10.4 11.10.5 11.11
12 12.1 12.1.1 12.1.2 12.1.3
CONTEJ\TS
MC zw- < OC *s-w- ................................................................................ 100 Loss of pre-initial r- ................................................................................ 100 Medial *-w- ............................................................................................ l 00 Loss of ST and foreign medial -w- in Chinese .............................................. 100 Chinese doublets with and without medial *w .............................................. 101 ST *-Wg in OC ........................................................................................ 101
OLD CHINESE VOWELS AND THEIR FOREIGN COUNTERPARTS ......... 102 OC *a ................................................................................................. 102 WT 0 for PTB *a .................................................................................... 102 OC *a ~ *g variations .............................................................................. 103 OC *a alternating with *-e / *-i ................................................................. l03 Variants *-a - *-ai ................................................................................. 104 Variants *-a ~ *0 .................................................................................... 104 OC *;:) ................................................................................................... 105 OC *g in unstressed syllables .................................................................... 105 OC *-g = PTB *i ...................................................................................... IO5 OC *e .................................................................................................. 106 OC *e in open syllables ............................................................................ 106 OC *-e foreign ia I ja ........................................................................... 1 06 OC *e from *ai ....................................................................................... l 07 OC *-e for foreign *i ............................................................................ 107 OC *e ~ *0 ............................................................................................. 1 08 OC *-ai ................................................................................................. 108 OC *-i ................................................................................................. 108 ST *i - *u variations ............................................................................... l 09 OC *i for AA *a .................................................................................... l 09 OC *-gi, *-ui ......................................................................................... II 0 Variations between *g - *;.)j - *i - *e ........................................................ 110 OC *-gj - *-i .......................................................................................... 110 OC *g - *e, *i in closed syllables .............................................................. 111 OC and ST *u and *0 .............................................................................. 112 OC *0 ................................................................................................... 112 OC *0 corresponding to ST *-u > PTB *-u ................................................... 113 OC *-0 - '"-au ........................................................................................ 114 OC *0 I *u for foreign *a? ....................................................................... 114 OC *u .................................................................................................... 114 OC *-u for PTB and foreign *-0 ................................................................ 115 Labial dissimilation ................................................................................ 115 Labial dissimilation before dental finals ..................................................... 1 16 Labial dissimilation with open / velar final syllables .................................. 116 Exceptional correspondences ..................................................................... 117 OC *-au, *-auk ..................................................................................... 118
TRANSLITERATIONS OF FREQUENTLY QUOTED LANGUAGES ............ 119 Chinese (CH) .......................................................................................... 119 Later Han Chinese ................................................................................... 120 Minimal Old Chinese (OCM) .................................................................... 121 Chinese dialects (= Sinitic languages) ......................................................... 125
ix
CONTENTS
12.2 Jingpo (JP) (= Kachin) ............................................................................ 126 12.3 Lushai ................................................................................................... 126 12.4 Mikir. .................................................................................................... 128 12.5 Tai ........................................................................................................ 128 12.6 Tibeto-Burman (TB) ................................................................................. 128 12.7 Tiddinl Chin ....................................................................... '" ................ 129 12.8 Written Burmese (WB) .......................................................................... 129 12.9 Written Tibetan (WT) .............................................................................. 129
APPENDIX A: Languages and language families in East Asia ..................................... 131 APPENDIX B: Alphabetic list of frequently cited languages ......................................... 134 APPENDIX C: Text sources for earliest occurrences .................................................. .136 REFERENCES ......................................................................................................... 138
DICTIONARY A -Z ............................................................................................... 149
x
PREFACE
This etymological dictionary attempts to provide information on the origin of Old Chinese
words, including possible word family relationships within Chinese and outside contacts.
When traditional Chinese scholars discuss "etymology" (cfywin they tend to debate
the history and uses of Chinese characters and perhaps variant reading pronunciations, but not
words. The present endeavor is an etymological dictionary which is concerned with the actual
words of Old Chinese (DC). not with their graphic representations.
Pulleyblank (1991: 20) remarked that the compilation of a "proper etymological dictiona­
ry" of Chinese still lies in the future. In this sense, the future has not yet arrived and, for that
matter, may never arrive, because many morphological mechanisms and morphemes are not
understood. It is usually difficult to identify even the root or stem of a word, although this
crucial question has been addressed by Sagart (1999). Often the best we can do is group words
into word families (wf[s» on the basis of phonological and semantic similarity.
A glance at an etymological dictionary for a well-studied and reasonably well-understood
Indo-European language shows that even there, many, perhaps a majority, of the entries state
outright that the etymology is "unknown" or "obscure" or the entry is qualified by such terms
as "probably," "perhaps," "possibly," or "hardly." The history of Old Chinese is much less
understood. Nevertheless, over the past decades our knowledge of Chinese and related Tibeto­
Burman (TB) languages has progressed far enough that for many DC words some historical
insights can be suggested. Frequently, different scholars have proposed competing etymologies;
this work mentions some of these alternatives as long as they seem to hold some plausibility.
As we gain more insights, one or another etymological suggestion may be confirmed or turn
out to be untenable.
Of competing possible or plausible etymologies, the ones in this dictionary are justified by
the phonological and morphological patterns and parameters set forth in the introductory
chapters. Given the many open questions and multiple interpretations, fellow investigators will
probably not find their favorite etymologies in these pages, as these are, of course, based on
their particular reconstructions of Old Chinese and its etymological frameworks. To elucidate
the history of a word, one looks for possible connections and relationships with other items.
However, just as often, similar-looking words are not related. Sino-Tibetan (ST) proto-forms
are generally not reconstructed because of many uncertainties. For example, it is obvious and
virtually certain that duo *toi7 'hanging tuft of hair' is cognate to Written Burmese (WB)
twarB 'be pendant, hang', but we cannot tell if the ST source might have been *toi, *twai, *tol,
*twal, or something else.
This work has been written also with the non-specialist, someone who is not familiar with
Chinese linguistics, in mind. Therefore, conventional Chinese linguistic terms have on
occasion been replaced with ones that are more easily interpreted by non-experts. For instance,
the tones pfngsheng, shfmgsheng, qusheng. and rDsheng are identified by the letter symbols with
which they are often marked in transcriptions, thus tone A, B, C, and D.
The lexical material on which this work is based is attested in Old Chinese texts from the
Shang dynasty oracle bone inscriptions (ca. 1250-1050 BC) down through the Han period (ca.
Xl
PREFACE
200 BC~AD 200). In the compilation of this work, later items as well as modern dialect forms
have been noted on occasion, and have been left in as gratuitous material; the reader who
wishes for thematic purity can cross them out. Words for which there is no etymological
information or hypothesis are generally not cited, as are, unfortunately, items overlooked or
not recognized by this compiler. Occasionally tonal derivations are also ignored because they
are often quite transparent, requiring no comment.
The present work has relied heavily on, and quotes accordingly, comprehensive works on
languages of the area, including: Benedict 1972, Sino-Tibetan Conspectus (STC); N. C. Bod­ man 1980, Chinese and Sino-Tibetan; W. S. Coblin 1986, A Sin%gist '5 Handlist of Sino­ Tibetan (HST); l. Peiros and S. Starostin 1996, A Compclrative Vocabulary of Five Sino­ Tibetan Languages (CVST); J. A. Matisoff 2003, Handbook of Proto-Tibeto-Burman; R. Schafer 1974, Introduction to Sino-Tibetan (lST); Shf Xi~tngdong 2000, Hilnyu he Zlmgyu; U.
Unger, Hao-ku; Wang U 1982, T6ngyuan zidi{lll; Jenner and Pou 1980-1981, A Lexicon of Khmer Morphology; G. Diffloth 1984, Dvaravati Old Mon; and more detailed studies by
many others. It is these informative sources which are quoted; reference is not systematically made to the scholar or work which should be credited with an etymology'S origin, as these
sources can be looked up in Jeon K wang-jie 1996, Etymological Studies of Sino- Tibetan Cognate Words. This work has anticipated many an etymological proposal which, at the time unbeknownst to me, had already been made by others; may they claim credit who are entitled
to it (1 encountered many such in works by Gong Hwang-cherng and the dissertation of Barba­ ra Geilich). A wealth of linguistic data from languages in Assam, SE Asia, and SW China has become available in recent years (e.g., Huang Bufan 1992, A Tibeto-Burman Lexicon). However, until these raw data are analyzed and protoforms or morphemic transcriptions developed, they are difficult to evaluate. They are therefore rarely quoted in this work.
Reference is made not only to formal publications, but also to conference papers and personal
communications, because these have provided many insightful or interesting suggestions relevant to the present endeavor.
A note on rhyme - rime. In the literature on Chinese linguistics, one often encounters the spelling 'rime' instead of 'rhyme' in reference to Chinese rime categories, rime tables, and the
like. (A recent book is on Rime Tables, not Rhyme Tables.) This practice, started by Chao Yuen Ren in 1943, is followed here.
A note on the paragraphs starting with [E] (etymological connections). Is the connection with Sino-Tibetan or Tibeto-Burman languages, the relationship is genetic. With any other language family, we have to assume a loan relationship (also substrate or adstrate), the direction of borrowing is often not clear, although more material has apparently been absorbed by Proto-Chinese and Old Chinese than is customarily admitted.
The index of English glosses ('English Index') is hoped to be useful as a starting point for inquiries. But such an index has its limitations, because only a few words are selected, and because many vague definitions like 'ample' or 'brilliant' are not very instructive. Also, the index does not distinguish between homophones like wind vb. and wind n.
xii
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This project has profited from conversations with, and suggestions and advice from, many
scholars and friends, including the late P. K. Benedict, William Baxter HI, Wolfgang Behr,
W. South Coblin, Richard Cook, Gerard Diffloth, Barbara Geilich, Zev Handel, Gong
Hwang-cherng, Victor Mair, Prapin Manomaivibool, James A. Matisoff, Martine Mazaudon,
Boyd Michailovsky, Jerry and Stella Norman, Kathleen Nuzum, Martha Ratliff, Paula
Roberts, Laurent Sagart, Jackson T.-S. Sun, Ken-ichi Takashima, Ulrich Unger, Anne
Yue-Hashimoto, Zhu Ling, and many others. W. S. Coblin has kindly provided the forms for
Early Ming and Yuan Mandarin, as well as his Han Dynasty transcriptional data, which have
been taken into consideration for Later Han Chinese. James A. Matisoff has generously
supported me by providing crucial books and material.
I am particularly grateful to an anonymous reader who made thoughtful suggestions and
significant comments on a penultimate draft version. But the mistakes which are still in the
following pages are this author's responsibility. Most of all, I wish to express my special
gratitude and appreciation to Victor Mair for his encouragement and manifold generosity; it
was he who arranged for the compilation of this work and secured financial support through
grants from the Freeman Foundation and other sources.
XIll
ARRANGEMENT OF THE DICTIONARY
This etymological dictionary groups related words into word families (wf[s]), which are listed
either under the most common member or under what appears to be the shortest and most basic word from which the others are thought to derive or to which they may be related. The head of a wf is not necessarily a common or well-known word. The reason for this arrange­
ment is dictated by the etymological purpose of this work. Large wfs or somewhat speCUlative
ones are broken up into smaller groups with cross-references. The sections of the Introduction are not intended as a coherent narrative, but as a brief
reference manual for the purpose of explaining and justifying the etymological groupings
(word families, cognate sets) in the dictionary. The introduction presents morphological and
phonological correspondence patterns so that readers may judge for themselves the degree of
the plausibility of suggested etymological connections. Phonology and morphology are
discussed together under the particular phoneme in question. Dictionary entries make reference to these sections of the Introduction, preceded by the
symbol § (e.g., "see § 12.1 ").
Sample entry:
shu! 7J<. (swiB) LH sui B, S tsui B, oeM *lhui'?, OCB *[l]hui? ? 'Water, river' rOB, ShiJ. [f] Sin Sukchu SR ~uj, ~i ( PR ~i, LR ~uj; MGZY shue (1:.) [?u£]; ONW sui [D] PMin *t8ui B
[E] ST: TB *lwi(y) [STC no. 210] > IP lui 33 'to flow'.
FIRST LINE
pinyfn transcription of Mandarin, followed by the Chinese character(s) Z1:=f:. When no character exists (as is often the case with colloquial dialect forms) an empty box D takes its place.
( ... ) Middle Chinese (MC) or Qieyun system (QYS), ca. AD 600. See §12.l.
LH Later Han Chinese (also LHan) of the I st and 2nd century AD. See § 12.1.l. In the text, LHan is usually placed in brackets, thus [ka] = LHan ko unless otherwise identified.
S alternate Old South form of LHan, as revealed by later southern, usually MIn, dialects.
OCM Minimal Old Chinese form (starred items). See §12.1.2. For comparison, Baxter's OC (OCB) is ocasionally also supplied.
SECOND LINE Gloss not a complete definition of a word. Glosses are mostly taken from, or are
based on, Karlgren's GSR, Schuessler's DEZ, Gildiii Hanyu cidian
edited Chen Fuhua fl*![W (Beijing 1999), and the ZhOng wen dflcfdiflIl r::p X
[ ... ] 111 brackets, the text in which the CH word is first attested, e.g., [Shi] = occurs first in the text ShiJfng, which implies that the word existed already by 600 BC or earlier. For abbreviations, see p. xvii ff.
xv
ARRANGEMENT OF THE DICTIONARY
THIRD LINE and subsequent lines [<] shows the morphological derivation from its simplex. [D] Chinese dialect forms; col. colloquial form (bai B), lit. literary or
reading form (wen Dialects (actually Sinitic languages) are identified by location. See § 12.1.3. Since many of them are not well known, the dialect affiliation is prefixed to the name of the location. These abbreviations are: G mm, K Kejia (Hakka), M Min, W Wu, X::: Xiang, Y Yue (Cantonese), Mand. ::: Mandarin, P- Proto-, as in PMin Proto-Min, also CMin :::: Common Min.
IE] comments on etymology, especially foreign connections. When flush with the preceding gloss, it relates only to the preceding word; when flush with subentries (3~ allofams), it relates to the whole wf and its stem / root.
[N] introduces further notes or comments.
[fl transcriptions of the Chinese word; these are occasionally provided to show a word's later development (see § 12.1): Sin Sukchu or Sin S. (EMing :::: Early Ming period Chinese); SR 'standard reading,' PR 'popular reading,' LR 'left reading.'
MGZY :::: Menggil zj'yun C'Phags-pa) of the Yuan (Mongol) period (1270- l308). ONW(C) Old Northwest Chinese from about AD 400, as interpreted by Coblin 1994. Occasionally Sui-Tang Chang'an (Coblin's STCA, ca. AD 640) and MTang (Middle Tang, ca. AD 77 5) forms are also added.
( ... ) the scholarly source, literature. [ ... ] the source of a foreign word without reference to etymological connection
with Chinese. In the sample entry above, [STC ... ] indicates that the TB items are taken from Benedict's work, but he has not identified CH shu] as the cognate.
3~ 'cognate (to)' or 'allofam' (fellow member in a word family).
<> 'related, cognate to' other languages, including ones from other language families, genetically or by loan; the direction of borrowing is not certain.
> 'developed into, becomes'. < 'derives from an earlier form I from an earlier stage of a language'. .... cross-reference to other dictionary entries. Less common pronunciations of a
character can easily be located under a better-known cognate: thus s1 is not separately entered in the dictionary with a reference to .... sf because si
can be found under its better-known simplex sf -> 'loaned to'. <- 'borrowed from'.
XVI
o ~
§
a. AA AAS abbr. acc. to AM aux. Beida AN BEFEO BI BiHP
BMFEA BSLP BSOAS BTD BV [C] CAAAL CH CDC CLAO cogn. [D] DEZ dilr. E [E] EAC EOC f. (ff.) FY
SYMBOLS AND ABBREVIATIONS
no Chinese graph exists (for a dialect word) cognate, alIofam, members of a wf within a language cognate(s), or loans between languages in either direction; separates forms cited from different language families s. w. as = same word as variant develops into deri ves from introduces a morphological derivation, a derivative from borrowed from loaned into cross-reference section / paragraph of the Introduction
and Austroasiatic (languages) Association for Asian Studies abbreviation(s) according to Asia Major auxiliary (e.g., verb) BeijIng Daxue: Hanyu fangyan elhui Austronesian (languages) Bulletin de 1 'Ecole Franfaise d'Extreme Orient bronze inscriptions Bulletin of the institute of History and Philology (Academia Sinica, Taiwan) ( J1l92lltf~n!Jf%rJT;tiHlj)
Bulletin of the Museum of Far Eastern Antiquities, Stockholm Bulletin de 1a societe linguistique de Paris Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies, London Han Buddhist Transcriptional Dialect (W. S. Coblin. ms) Bahing-Vayu languages (= Kiranti languages; Tibeto-Burman) introduces comments on further cognates Computational Analysis of Asian and African Languages Chinese Common Dialectal Chinese (J. Norman's reconstruction) Cahiers de Linguistique Asie Orientale cognate introduces Chinese dialect forms A. Schuessler, A Dictionary of Early Zhou Chinese ditransitive east( ern); early introduces etymological comments Dobson, Early Archaic Chinese Early Old Chinese, Shang and early Western Zhou following page(s) ( 1) Fang yan by Yang Xiong (2) the modern journal Fangyan
XVII
G- GSR GY GYSX Hao-ku HCT HJAS HK HOCP HPTB HST
ICSTLL id. intr. IG 1ST J(.) JA JAOS JAS JCL JCLTA JDSW JGWZ JIES JP JR JWGL K- K. Kan. KC KN KS KT LAC LB LB-M 19· (198.)
LH, LHan LL LOC LTBA Lush. M- Mxx MC MGZY MK
SYMBOLS AND ABBREVIA nONS
Gan dialects B. Karlgren, Grammata serica recensa Guang-yun Yu Nai-yang 1974. Hu zhUjiiwzheng Song ben Guang-yun Shi:'m lii'inshi ±. Guangyun shengxi Ulrich Unger, Hao-ku. Sinoiogische Rundbriefe Li Fangkuei 1977, A Handbook of Comparative Tal Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies Hong Kong William H. Baxter 1992, Handbook of OC phonology Matisoff 2003, Handbook of Proto-Tibeto-Burman W. South Coblin 1986, A Sin010gist's Handlist of Sino-Tibetan Lexical Comparisons International Conference on Sino-Tibetan Languages and Linguistics idem (the same as above) intransitive indo-germanisch (' Indo-European') R. Shafer, Introduction to Sino-Tibetan Journal Journal Asiatique Journal of the American Oriental Society Journal for Asian Studies Journal of Chinese Linguistics Journal of the Chinese Teachers' Language Association Jingdilm shlwen by LU Deming U Xiaoding J18gU wenzl jfshi !fl1£l'X~~~ Journal of Indo-European Studies Hng-po *~J'i (a Tibeto-Burman language) rGya-rung = Jia-rong (a Tibeto-Burman language) Zh6u Htgo ,ljIfji*i'ili, Jfnwen gUlfn (bU) (fill) Kejia (Hakka) dialects Kachin (a Tibeto-Burman language close to or identical with Jing-po) Kanauri (a Tibeto-Burman language of the Himalayan branch) Kuki-Chin languages (Tibeto-Burman) Kuki-Chin-Naga languages (Tibeto-Burman) Kam-Sui languages Kam-Tai languages Dobson, Late Archaic Chinese Lolo-Burmese languages (a Tibeto-Burman branch) Matisoff's reconstruction of LB language( s) Later Han Chinese Language and Linguistics (Academia Sinica, Taipei) Later Old Chinese (Zhangu6) Linguistics of the Tibeto-Burman Area Lushai (a Tibeto-Burman language of the Kuki-Naga branch) Min dialects Middle xx (e.g., MM = Middle Mon) Middle (or ancient) Chinese (ca. AD 600) Menggu ziyun Mon-Khmer languages
xviii
MKS MM,MMon MS MSOS MY MZYW [N] n. Oxx OB OC OCB OCM OE OL OM ONW(C) P p. c. PCH perh. PLB PMin pass. prob. PTai PTib. PVM PWA PWMiao QY QY(S) S. Siam. Skt. Sorui SSYP Sf STC SV sv. SW SWIZGL s. w. as [T] TB TSR Tib. tf.
vb.
Mon-Khmer Studies Middle Man (an Austroasiatic language) Monumenta Serica Mitteilungen des Seminars flir Orientalische Sprachen Miao-Yao (Hmong-Mian) languages Mfnzu yuwen ~1m;'fg)( introduces further notes noun Old xx (e.g., OC = Old Chinese) Shang dynasty oracle bone inscriptions Old (or archaic) Chinese Old Chinese, Baxter's reconstruction Minimal Old Chinese, see §13.1 Oriens extremus Oceanic Linguistics Old Mon (an Austroasiatic language) Old Northwest Chinese ca. AD 400 (W. S. Coblin, Old Northwest Chinese) Proto personal communication Proto-Chinese perhaps Proto-Lola-Burmese (= 'Lolo-Burmese,' LB) Proto-Min (1. Norman 'g reconstructions) possibly probably Proto-Tai Proto-Tibetan Proto-Viet-Mong languages Proto-W estern-A ustronesian Proto-Western-Miao Qieyiln:f!JJ ~ Qieyun system, i.e., MC (or 'ancient Chinese') reconstructions Siamese Siamese Sanskrit Shima Kunia S1 sheng yilnpu Sino-Tibetan
Inkyo bokuji sorui }}.!I:tll!i r-~1'~m by Liang Sengblio
Paul K. Benedict, Sino-Tibetan: A Conspectus Sino-Vietnamese stative verb Xu Shen ~'Ft~, Shu[)wen jiezl Drng Fubao Tmf*, ShuDwen jiezl gulfn ~)(~$,¥&:it'"
same word as introduces transcriptional forms Tibeta-Burman James A. Matisoff, The Loloish Tonal Split Revisited Tibetan transitive verb
xix
Vietnamese west (ern) WU dialects Written Burmese word family (families) Written- Written Tibetan
WTib. Western Tibetan dialects X- Xiang dialects Y- Yue dialects (Cantonese) YWYJ Yuwen yanjiii YYWZX Yuyan wenZl xue Zang-Mian 1992 Huang BUfan J{;ffi}L et aI., Zang-Mianyu zu yuyan dhui jjJlUiJjjf,t:f1mf,H§~PJIHE ZGYW Zhonggu6 yUwen r:j:l~f,Y)( ZM92 short for Zang-Mian 1992 (Beijing) ZWDCD Zhong wen daddian r:j:l)(*~9!!
xx
OLD CHINESE AND ETYMOLOGY
1.1 Chinese Old Chinese (OC 'archaic Chinese', Shanggu Hanyu 1:. tif:l~Fg) is the language of texts and
documents from the beginning of writing, around 1250 BC, to the Wln period. See § 12.1.2 for the characteristics of the OC language as well as for its subsequent stages: Later Han Chinese (LH, LHan), ca. 2nd-3rd cent. AD; Old Northwest Chinese (ONW) of ca. AD 400; Middle
Chinese (MC = 'ancient Chinese', Zhonggu Hanyu $tii:l~tb of about AD 600, which is
widely quoted as a reference for historical phonological categories; and later transcriptions of
Chinese. The different stages of written Chinese probably represent koines which are not necessarily descended from one another in a straight line (§ 1.3). Modern dialects (more
properly Sinitic languages), including Mandarin, have evolved over centuries and millennia.
The most archaic group of these languages is the Min dialects, which had split off from the mainstream during the Qin and Han dynasties (§12.1.3).
1.1.1 Sources a/Old Chinese The earliest records of the Chinese language are the oracle bone inscriptions (OB) of the Shang
dynasty from c. 1250-1050 BC. From the subsequent Western Zh5u Jj5j period (l050-770
BC) have survived not only hundreds of inscribed bronze vessels (BI), but also the older parts
of the Shijfng ~~t:~ (Book of Songs), parts of the ShujTng (Book of Documents), the old
parts of the Yijfhg ~*'~ or ZhOuyi !-t;j ~ (Book of Changes), and the Yi ZhOushii ~Jj5j Literary records gradually increase in volume and variety after the end of Western Zh5u with
the beginning of the Spring and Autumn period (Chiinqiu lffj( 722-481 BC), the Warring
States period (Zh!mgu6 !f!x~ 403-221 BC), Qfn (221-206 BC) and Will i:l (206 BC-AD 220) dynasties. The literary sources are abbreviated as in Karlgren's GSR (see Appendix C). Complete information on all the early Chinese texts is conveniently available in Michael
Loewe, ed. 1993.
1.2 Old Chinese and its linguistic neighbors The eastern half of the China of today's political maps, including the provinces Yunnan, Si­ chuan, and Gansu, is, and has been, rich in linguistic diversity with several language families: Sino-Tibetan (ST) with its Sinitic (Chinese = CH) and Tibeto-Burman (TB) branches, Kam-Tai (KT), Miao-Yao (MY = Hmong-Mien), and Austroasiatic (AA). In adjacent areas are spoken Austronesian (AN) and Altaic languages; at one time the Indo-European (IE) Tocharians were China's western neighbors (Pulleyblank 1983; Norman 1983: 6ff).
No language lives in a hermetically sealed sphere. "Whatever their genetic affiliation, the
languages of the East and SE Asia area have undergone massive convergence in all areas of their structure phonological, grammatical, and semantic" (Matisoff HPTB: 7). Throughout the millennia, prehistoric and early historic "Chinese" had interacted with speakers of other
languages. An expanding and magnetic state and civilization attracts and absorbs other popu­ lations and their languages; compare, for instance, the situation in early China with that of
ancient Italy where Latin absorbed words and features from Central Italian IE languages. Thus
1.2.1 OLD CHINESE AND ETYMOLOGY
Latin has two words for 'red': rufus and ruber. The latter reflects the regular Latin develop­
ment from IE, while rufus was absorbed from another Italic language.
Outside influences on the Chinese language have long been noted. M. Hashimoto (1976;
1984) draws attention to foreign substrate influence in the syllable structure and tone systems
of modern Chinese dialects which agree with Tai and Miao-Y ao languages in the south, while
words become more polysyllabic and tones fewer in number as one moves northward in the
direction of China's polysyllabic, atonal Altaic neighbors. The modern Vue dialects have been
shown to include a Tai substratum (Yue-Hashimoto 1976; R. Bauer 1987), MIn dialects an
Austroasiatic (AA) one (Norman / Mei 1976; Norman 1983; Mei 1980). Mei Tsu-lin and 1.
Norman have collected AA loan words found in Old Chinese literature, while other items have
long been thought to be of Miao-Y ao and Tai origin (Bodman 1980). Therefore it should be no
surprise that the vocabulary which we encounter in the earliest Old Chinese writing, the oracle
bone and bronze inscriptions, includes many non-ST words.
Over the years, proposals have been made to connect Chinese genetically with other
language families in the area, particularly (Kam-)Tai, Miao-Yao (Hmong-Mien), and even as
far removed as Austronesian and Indo-European. Genetic relationship to language groups
other than TB have, for the purposes of the present work, not yet been convincingly demonstra­
ted, or are so remote and controversial as to be of little practical value for the understanding
of Old Chinese. Shared linguistic features and vocabulary with languages other than TB are
therefore treated here as borrowings in one direction or the other. Relationships and contacts
with other languages will be treated briefly below.
1.2.1 Chinese and Sino-Tibetan Chinese and Tibeto-Burman (TB) languages are descended from a hypothetical Sino-Tibetan
(ST) proto-language (Benedict STC; Thurgood / LaPolla, eds. 2003; Matisoff HPTB; and
others). TB proto-forms are reconstructed on the basis of languages which extend from Tibet
in the west to Burma and SE China in the east. Among these, Tibetan and Burmese playa
prominent role because they have long written traditions and are well documented; they are
therefore extensively cited in the literature and convey, rightly or wrongly, the impression of
particularly close historical ties to Oc. (For a list of Chinese dialects and classification of TB
and other languages, see Appendices A and B.)
ST languages agree in fundamental ways in their phonology, lexicon, and morphology.
This dictionary includes numerous examples of the shared OC-TB (i.e., ST) lexical stock. OC
and TB phonology and morphology will be compared and discussed throughout this introduc­
tion (§2-§12). The reader will get the impression that OC (at least as reconstructed within
Baxter's framework) does not look very different from TB reconstructions and shares much of
its morphology (prefixes, suffixes, etc.). Syntax is, however, quite varied among ST languages;
thus in Chinese, the qualifier is placed before the qualified element whereas Written Tibetan,
for example, reverses the order, e.g., OC diJ ('great') wang (,king') 'great king' vs. WT rgyal­
po chen-po ('king / great'); WT agrees in this regard with many other East Asian languages.
Nevertheless, given the agreement in the remaining three areas of phonology, lexicon, and
morphology, this does not disprove a genetic relationship.
The cleavage of ST into a Sinitic and TB branch rests on a hypothetical ST vowel *;) which
has been retained in OC, but has merged with ST *a in TB. There are occasional hints,
however, that the TB proto-language might also have made this distinction (STC p. 183, n.
482). Innovations unique to CH do not establish a fundamental split in the ST family, they
2
OLD CHINESE AND ETYMOLOGY 1.2.2 - 1.2.4
only distinguish the Sinitic branch from other TB branches and from languages like Lolo­ Burmese or Tibetan. Such Sinitic diagnostic items include the split of syllables into high vs.
low types (later reflected in the Qieyun system '8 [MC] division III vs. I1IV: see § 12.1); this
looks like the split into lax vs. tense register in MK languages (Ferlus 1998). To some words
which end in an open syllable in TB, and elsewhere, a final *-k is added, thus TB (b)rya vs. bai OCM *brak '100'. Universal fYfB *(s)mrul - *(s)bruJ * CH hur EllJ])g (xjweiB) *hm(r)uj'( «
*hmrul?) already has been replaced on the OB by she illt (dzja) *m-lai as the common word for
this creature.
1.2.2 Tibeto-Burman languages TB languages are found today in some isolated pockets in SW China; the speakers are referred
as tu-jiii ±* 'locals'. This shows that TB speakers lived in ancient times in the vicinity of
the Xia and Shang states. Especially the Qiang 5t: neighbors of Shang China to the west have probably been TB, as well as the Rang tt(; in Shanxi (PulleybJank 1983: 416ft). Since Chinese absorbed loans from KT, MY, and MK languages, we can expect loans from TB also. These are difficult to detect, though, because they would probably look like ST cognates. A likely TB loan is the word for 'tea', eha (c)a) *d-la; it likely goes back to the Loloish word *la 'leaf',
unless the CH word was directly borrowed from an AA language, ultimately the source of the Loloish word.
1.2.3 Miao- Yao Miao-Yao (EEl' MY Hmong-Mien) languages form, for our purposes, their own language
family, unrelated to Chinese and ST. The vocabulary of MY languages includes a large
number of Chinese words, borrowed at different periods and from different dialects (notably
Yue), but also loans from TB (Benedict 1987) and AA (Forrest 1948; Haudricourt 1966). Today, MY settlements are scattered over wide areas of southern China and Southeast
Asia. It is suspected that the people in the ancient state of Chu spoke MY languages (Pulley­
blank 1983: 423ft), among others, because words of MY origin show up in the text Chile! (Songs from the Chu area) of the Han period (Schuessler 2004).
A MY loan, for example, is xiang ti~JiI~ (sjaI]AjB/C) *nha!]?/h 'bring food to' (workers in
the field), 'to eat', from MY: Anc. Miao ilonc'cooked rice, food', Yao: Biao Min IJaI]5, Mien (Chiang Rai dial.) {lhaaI]5, Dzao Men naI]5.
1.2.4 Tai-Kadai, Kam-Tai Kam-Tai languages (KT) are not related to Chinese and ST (Dai Qingxia 1991). Massive lexical exchanges in both directions between Chinese and Tai, from OC to more recent dia­ lects, have led some investigators to conclude otherwise. In the distant past, people speaking these languages likely lived in areas as far north as the Yangtze River basin. For example, the ruling family of the ancient state of ChlJ had the clan name xi6ng 'bear', but in the Chu
language the name was mT which is the KT word for 'bear'. Today, though, KT people live farther to the south in GUangXI, Guizh6u, and southern Hunan (Pulleyblank 1983: 429ft).
There have been significant exchanges of vocabulary in both directions between MK
(including Viet-Muong) and Tai languages; Lao especially has many loan words from its Vietnamese neighbor. Tai languages also have relatively recent Khmer loans, an earlier layer
of loans from Mon, and loans from an even older Northern AA language that today is
represented by Khmu and that the Tai must have overlain at some early date (Ferlus 1978:
3
1.2.5 1.2.6 OLD CHINESE AND ETYMOLOGY
13-14, n.22). Consequently, some alleged Chinese-Tai lexical sets turn out to be spurious, the Tai words being loans from Khmer or elsewhere. For example, Siamese suan AJ 'garden' has nothing to do with .... yuan *wan 'garden', but is borrowed from Khmer swna /suu;;In/ 'care for, look after> flower / pleasure garden'. Or consider Tai lU8I] 'royal'; it reflects the Khmer word lU;:}I] 'king' and has no (direct?) connection with Chinese .... huang ~ 'august, royal'.
An example of a KT word in OC is chan }. *dran 'farm, farmyard', from Tai: Siamese B8n A2 < *rtanA , Kam-Sui (PKS) *hra:n l 'house'.
1.2.5 Austroasiatic The Austroasiatic (AA) language family is unrelated to ST and Chinese. AA languages fall into two major groups: Munda (exclusively on the Indian subcontinent); and Mon-Khmer (MK) scattered over Assam, Southeast Asia, and SW China and includes the Mon language in Burma, and Khmer in Cambodia. As only MK languages could have left traces in China, the terms MK and AA are often synonymous here.
AA loans have been identified in TB languages such as Lepcha (Forrest 1948) and in languages in Assam such as the Tani group (1. Sun LTBA 16:2, 1993: 165); AA lexical material is also encountered in Lushai (in this dictionary), in the TB Kanauri-Almora language Raji (Sharma 1990, vol. III, part II: 170-228), as well as transparent Khasi loans in Mikir. MK influence in Old Chinese and ST has also received some attention (Shorto 1972; Ferlus 1998; LTBA 22:2, 1999: 1-20; Schuessler 2003; 2004; studies by Norman and Mei). Languages from at least two AA branches or layers have contributed to prehistoric and perhaps early historic Chinese: an early Viet-Muong language similar to Vietnamese (that may be called 'Viet-Yue') (§1.2.6) and a language (or languages) in the Yellow River basin that shows affinities to the modern Khmer and Khmu branches of MK, and on occasion also to Mon (§ 1.2.7).
Purely historical and philological considerations also point to the prehistoric and early historic presence of AA in parts of northern China. The ancient Yi 5& people, who lived in the east from the Shandong peninsula south to the Yangtze, were probably AA (Pulleyblank 1983: 440ft). The ancient Yue IflR people in Zhejiang were certainly AA; the place Langye In
Shandong was their traditional cultural center (Yue jue shU; Eberhard 1968: 414ft). Under the year 645 BC, the Zuozhuan quotes a line from the famous Yijing where we find
the AA word for 'blood', huang *hmaIJ (PAA *mham or the like) substituted for the usual ST etymon xue Ifll (Mei 1980). The deliberations in which context this line is quoted and apparently understood by all participants took place north of the Yellow River in today's Shanxi. Huang cannot have been a CH innovation, rather it must have been a survival from an earlier substrate language that was replaced by a ST layer, i.e., 'Chinese' as we know it.
When pursuing OC and TB / ST etyma down to their apparent roots, one often seems to hit AA bedrock, that is, a root shared with AA.
1.2.6 Vietnamese In addition to the significant influx of Chinese loans from antiquity to more recent times, Vietnamese has incorporated a large contingent of Tai words (Maspero 1912: 115). A language close to Vietnamese was spoken in SE China as late as the Han period by the ancient Yue IflRJJJ people (Yue OC *wat, the 'Viet' in Vietnam); it left a residue of Viet-Yue words in the modern Min dialects in Fuji~tn province (see articles by Norman and Mei, also quoted in Schuessler 2004). Early Chinese commentators have stated that the words zM 1L 'epidemic' and sou j! 'dog' are from the ancient Vue language (Pulleyblank 1983: 438f), but these might
4
OLD CHINESE AND ETYMOLOGY 1.2.7 - 1.2.8
have come from "northern" AA instead (see §L2.7); Han period scholars merely noted the similarity with the Yue words of which they happened to be aware. Unlike the later MIn dialects, OC does not include many words that compel us to conclude that the source was specifically Viet-Yue.
1.2.7 "Northern" Austroasiatie An AA substrate ("AA-OC") contributed a significant number of AA words as well as fragments of AA morphology to prehistoric and subsequent CH (§2.6; §S.l 0). MK words gradually trickled from a substrate into mainstream ST-based OC over hundreds or thousands of years, so that layers and various MK sources can be discerned.
The earliest, prehistoric layer of AA items is already encountered in the language of the first written records, the OB (1250-1050 BC); OC borrowings from this remote past occasionally do not agree very closely with MK phonologically (though in a regular fashion). For example, ehU ~ *tshro 'hay' vs. PMonic *ksJ::)Y (cL below), hli J"jft *hlii? 'tiger' vs. PMK *kla?
More "recent" items (found in BI, ShJlfng, and then later texts) agree more closely with AA
forms, e.g., cuo j *tshoih 'hay' vs. PMonic *kS:XlY (cL above),jiang ¥I *kroI] 'river' vs. PMonic *krooI]. Many such OC words appear to be very similar to Khmer. This does not mean that the MK substrate was Khmer, but only that Khmer happens to have preserved (and / or scholars happen to have provided) data that provide suggestive comparisons with OC, just as the great number of Tibetan OC comparative sets reflect more on the availability of Tibetan data, but not necessarily on a close historic relationship.
1.2.8 Summary The OC lexicon has many sources (Schuessler 2003). A few sample ST vs. non-ST words follow, to provide an impression (for details and explanations consult the dictionary entries):
Animals: ST words: 'ox' gang ~MJ, 'dog' quan ,*, 'rhinoceros' Xf~, 'horse' rna 'fowl' y~m ~ (quail), 'louse' shf£IR, 'muntjac' jr
Non-ST words: 'elephant' xiang 'dog' gou jt], 'buffalo' SI %, 'chicken' jf~tt 'tiger' hil JJf" 'pig' tuan -?k, 'pig' shl~, 'small deer' zhi ~
Body parts: ST: 'head' yuan ]C, 'head' shOu 'eye'mu ,'hair' shan !i~, 'fern. breast' ril !fL,
'bitter I liver' xfn $, 'forehead' e:m, 'blood' xue Ifn Non-ST: 'gall' dan 'forehead' sang ~&, 'blood' huang itii
Others: ST: 'root' ben 7fs:, 'forest' lin ~*, 'firewood' xfn iff, 'house' jia *, 'temple' zong
'day' rl a, 'year' nian 'breath' Xl 'eat I meal' can Non-ST: 'root' gen fIt 'forest' lu 'palace' gong 0'§L 'farm' chan ., 'temple'
miao~, 'moon' (goddess) heng-e ~g~ft 'year' ren f~, 'breath' qi ~, 'eat / meal' xiang timJ
Numerals and grammatical words generally are ST: 'two' er =, 'copula' wei 'behind' bOu
Of uncertain provenance: 'Wood' mil *, 'mountain' shan !lJ, 'flower' hua
5
1.3 OLD CHINESE AND ETYMOLOGY
1.3 Old Chinese dialects Languages which are spread over large areas and mountainous terrain naturally devclop regional varieties; stratified societies also exhibit differences in speech along class lines. The OC language of the Shang and Zhou period and subsequent Classical Chinese was a standardized written language without noticeable regional flavors. The Chinese script would have hidden differences in pronunciation that might have existed, just as today B 'day' is read r1 in Mandarin, j'et in Cantonese.
Yet one catches a few glimpses of language variation within OC when comparing the Shl]ihg rimes, the phonetic series and the later Middle Chinese (MC) as reflected in the Qii:~yiln dictionary (AD 60 I) as well as modern dialects.
First, in the Qieyiln and modern dialects, as well as in the OC phonetic series there are certain words with the OC analogue rimes *-el] such as ming -is 'name' which had in the Shl}ihg the rime *-in. The ST rimes *-iIJ I *-ik became either *-eIJ / *-ek or *-in I *-it in OC; which way a word went depended presumably on the dialect. Thus we find for ST I *-ik the OC rime *-el) I *-ek: ming -is 'name', ming q~ 'to sound', ming Pl1 'order', sheng 'live'; but xTn Jfr 'firewood' *tsit'masonry'.
! 1-1 ST Later South QYS/MC Shijing
not I -- *00 >bu /f *00> bU1'
not *rna *rna -- not have ! *ma >wu ~ --
not have -- *mal)? > wang I~J -....
name *r-mil] *mial) *mel) > ming ;g *min ;g .-.. --..
dark *mil) *mel) > ming ~ *mel) > ming 5't
night (MK mal]) *maI] *mel] > ming 1>1 *~el) > mfng ~~
green *C-sel] *tsbag *tshel) > qfng W *tshel) > qfng W
green *tshal) > cang i~ *tshal) > cang ?~
mother *mo *m6? > mil £J: *mS1>mu ro go-between MK dm;:lj *m~>mei~ *m~>mei ~
Secondly, OC labial-initial syllables of the type *Pd and *Po merged into *Pd in the Shl]ihg dialect(s) and the phonetic series, but remained distinct in the Qieyun and modern dialects (Baxter 1992); for exampJe, we have the Mandarin readings mei :ffJ: 'each' vs. mum 'mother' (same phonetic, same Shl]I'ng rime). Finally, a strain of OC must have retained ST *ma in the meaning 'not' because it is preserved in modern southern dialects, but does not exist in Shang and Western Zhou texts, apart from an occasional occurrence in classical texts. Table 1-1 illustrates these and additional differences within ~C.
Choice of words in individual texts often shows particular preferences that may be due to dialects. For example, in theZuozhuan :tL1t we find the interrogative xI' *ge 'how' instead of M{aJ *gai. In some chapters of the Shujfng the words for 'you' and 'your' are ril and niU J'J respectively; in others, the word for both 'you' and 'your' is er m. Later texts replace words common in earlier ones, e.g., the OB, BI, and some parts of the Shljfng and
6
OLD CHINESE AND ETYMOLOGY 1.3.1 104
Shiijrnghave the word wang *mal)? for 'not have, there is no'; only near the end of the Western Zhou period is it replaced by the familiar wu ~ *ma.
These and similar phenomena suggest a language that is far from uniform, but we cannot
tell whether these are individual preferences, or class or regional distinctions, nor if the latter,
from which regions.
1.3.1 Rural dialects Additional phonological oddities in OC may also be the result of dialectal differences. MC and, by backward projection, OC, has multiple phonological correspondences for what one surmises ought to be a single OC phonological configuration. Words with rare and unusual features typically have meanings with a rustic or vulgar flavor. We will, therefore, for now call this strain (or strains) 'Rural' as opposed to 'Standard', i.e., literary OC.
The following phonological peculiarities may be identified as Rural: (1) OC voiceless initials *r-, *1-, and *n- are normally reflected in MC coronal th_, §j-, and,
in the case of *r-, in MC {h_, (§5.1). However, in a few words such a voiceless continuant
has yielded MC X-, xj-, and its equivalents in modern dialects. This unexpected development to
a guttural initial is found in words that relate to ordinary, especially rural, life; they include
words for: beard, to face / toward, ribs (of a horse), to know, to vomit, to rear animals, stupid, to roar, tiger, pig (§5.6). To differentiate the two developments of voiceless initials, we will write OCM *Ih-, *nh-, *rh- for MC th_, §j-, etc., but OCM *hn-, *hl-, *hr- when it is the
aspiration that survives as MC X-. Of course, voiceless *hl)-, *hm-, and *hw- regularly yield MC x-, thus any voiceless initial that shows up as x- in MC is written in OCM with the *h­ preceding the sonorant
(2) Standard OC and foreign initial *1- (> MC ji-), or *1 in the initial, have in some words
merged with *r- (> MC J-). This might be another Rural feature; examples in §7.3 include: salt, turtle, grain I to sow, bamboo. The *1 = Rural OC *r equation is often encountered in loans from non-ST languages, e.g., eel, splint hat, barrier I bolt, descend, frost; or the confusion of
laterals may be due to the late date of borrowing in either direction. (3) Some non-ST words with initial *kl- have MC initial t- which may have been *tl- in OC.
Such words include:
<> AA: Khmu? kJam 'carryon the shoulder'
For more examples and comments, see §8.2.1.
(4) MC initialljj- and tj- stand in a few correspondence sets for a foreign initial r, or r in combination with labial or velar consonants (§7.lo4). The semantic range of such items conjures up a rural sphere: farm, pheasant, old man, to fall, bamboo, sickle, wrist, etc.
(5) Some modern southern dialects have in their colloquial layers the vowel a for standard e. This trend seems to be foreshadowed in some OC words which have the vowel a also for foreign e or i; see Table I 1 above, and § 11.1.3.
1.4 The study of Old Chinese etymology
A Chinese word may have one of several origins: (1) It can have been inherited from the hypothetical Sino-Tibetan proto-language when it has cognates among the related Tibeto­ Burman languages. (2) It can be a loan from another language, or can have survived from an
earlier substrate (Miao-Yao, Kam-Tai, Austroasiatic / Man-Khmer). (3) It can be the result of
7
internal innovation, i.e., word derivation by morphology, internal borrowing from dialects, or phonological change.
A word is usually assumed to be genetically related to another because of transparent or impressionistic phonological and semantic similarity. The range of sound alternations within an OC wf will be suggested throughout the introductory sections. Members of a wf, i.e., 'allo­ fams' (Matisoff's term, alias 'cogeners') typically differ in tone, initial voicing (e.g., *kens 'to see' ~E *gens 'appear'), and / or the Middle Chinese division (deng ~, i.e., vocalism, e.g., MC kfilJvs. kjaI]; see §9.1). Occasionally, they also differ in the vowel, in initial consonant(s) or final consonant. Since much concerning ST and Chinese morphology is still not well under­ stood, the terms 'wf' and 'allofam' are often fuzzy but conventional catch-all categories. For
example, it seems obvious that the wordsjian *krams 'look at' and l!m *riim? 'to see' are related, but what the difference in later tones and the presence I absence of an initial *k­ might have entailed is so far a matter of speculation. On the other hand, we can confidently state that zhJ *t;,kh or *t;,ks, literally 'something that has been woven', is a regular exo- passive derivation from zhd~ *t;,k 'to weave'. We consider bothjian and l!in, and zhTand zhi to be allofams in their respective word families.
1.4.1 Approaches to wordfamilies and cognates Investigators have differed significantly over the range of sound alternations within a word family. Karlgren (1933) allows for a broad range: a word family could have a final of the type -K, -T, or -P, etc. in conjunction with the initial consonant type K-, N-, or P-, etc. where T­ includes any acute initial consonant, i.e., any which is not a guttural or labial. For instance, his wf with items 242-262 (1933: 69) has a root T -K and includes the following words (Karl­ gren's 'archaic Chinese', i.e., OC; in parentheses OCM):
yang [~ *dial) (*lal)) 'light' 3~ zhao Wd *tiog (*tau) 'bright' ~~ zhbu ~ *tiog (*trukh) 'day time' * XIng Ji *siel) (*sel) 'star'
In this proposed wf, the OC initials, as understood today (Baxter), are *1-, *t-, *s-; the vowels are *a, *au (OCB *-aw), *e, *u; the finals are *-l), *-k, *-V (vowel). The TB cognate for yang is *lal) (e.g., WB iaI]B'be brighf), zhOu is clearly cognate to WT gdugs « g-duk-s) 'midday, noon'. These two TB items are certain ly not related. Therefore, Karlgren' s phonological para­ meters are much too broad.
Cognates usually share the same rime and initial consonant type. However, in many in­ stances an obvious cognate has a different final or rime. or initial variation outside the nor­ mal spectrum. LaPolla (see §6) has dedicated a study to ST rimes and finals. In order not to go off in all directions, investigators prefer to keep to a given rime and allow the initials to vary, or keep to one category of initials and then allow for variations in finals. Wang U (1958: 542-545) provides examples for both approaches: same initial but different rimes (such as the negatives with initial *m-), and same rime but different initials (such as rime *-al) 'bright'). Or note a wf proposed by Pulleyblank (1973: 121) (traditional MC forms in parentheses): rau -* (nzj::lu) ~~ ruan (nzjwanB) ~~ nuo il~ (nzju. nzjwiinB, nuanC) ~~ ruo (nzjak), all meaning 'soft', but he has not included ren ff (nzj;,m B) 'soft'. Wang U (1982) splits this particular group into one with a tendency toward final velars, and one with final dentals. Thus the set ril m1 (nzjwoB) ~~ rulm (nzjwanB) * nen, nun m (p. 571) is distinct from rau (nzj<m)~. ruo
(nzjak) •• rou ~ (nzjuk) 'meat, flesh' (p. 236). As long as we do not know more about OC morphology, we cannot tell if distinctions in this wf are due to morphological derivation,
8
OLD CHINESE AND ETYMOLOGY 1.4.2 1.4.3
dialect interference, or to convergence in which the initial n- would be associated with 'soft', just as words with initial gl- typically suggest something 'gliding, glossy' in English (§2.9).
1.4.2 Approaches to etymology through the graph The above approaches start with the OC word while the graph that writes it is of secondary concern. However, approaching etymology from the other end by emphatic reliance on the graph is fraught with the danger of misinterpretation or overinterpretation. This leads occasionally to "strained explanations of loangraph meanings as semantic extensions" (Qiu Xigui 2000: 287); it has been suggested, for example, that lfii 31<:: 'wheat' and lfij 31<:: 'to come'
are the same word (,wheat' is the cereal that 'came' from abroad), but the two are unrelated. Boodberg (1937: 339-341) went so far as to suggest that even graphic elements that are nearly
universally recognized as semantic and not phonetic playa phonological and etymological
role; for example, he believes that graphs written with the element z1 derive from a root
*BDZi - *BSI: zi 'self', bi" 'nose', xr}Bl 'breathe'. The traditional source for the interpretation of ancient graphs is Xu Shem' s ShuDwen jiezl
(SW) of ca. AD 150. But this is explicitly a dictionary of graphs, not words; it often describes a graph, which is not the same as an etymological explanation. For example, the SW (and also
GSR 1166c) explains jiflO 1~~ [kau B] 'burn on a pyre of crossed logs' as cognate to jiao 5( [kau 1 'to cross'. But the definition 'burn on crossed logs' could well have been suggested by the graphic element 'to cross'; therefore the word may have had just the meaning 'to burn' and be related to relevant TB items, but not to 'to cross'. Xu Shen also was unaware of the earlier
forms of graphs as they are known today from the OB inscriptions; he was inadvertently
misled by the graphic forms available at his time. Thus he explains the left element in the
graph for she!'f 'to shoot' as shen 'body'; the shen element, however, goes back to the OB image of a bow with an arrow (Qiu Xigui 2000: 55t).
We study the phonetic series and composition of graphs with interest because they often
offer etymological clues, but two words are not a priori assumed to be etymologically related just because they share a phonetic element. In the end, everyone of the above approaches contributes to interesting discoveries.
1.4.3 Identification of cognates Beside morphological patterns which are discussed throughout the introduction, the following considerations also help in the identification of etymological connections (see also §2.1 0). Matisoff's Conclusion to his HITB (pp. 535-542) could be quotes here in full as well.
Semantic parallels strengthen the case for the identification of etymological relations. For example, since jrhg * 'capital city' also means 'mound, hill', it is likely that qUi li 'village, town' is also the same word as the homophone qiil 'mound, hill'. Settlements are often built on higher ground.
Cognates from related TB languages sometimes help identify connections within Chinese.
For example, 'naked' IUD ~ *roi7, and cheng ::rE *drel) are probably cognate to such forms as PTB *groy > WT sgre-ba, and WT sgren-mo 'naked', Lushai {eenR 'bare', respectively. As the TB items derived from the same root, Chinese forms may have as well (cheng from PCH *(d)roi-l) ?).
On the other hand, the correct identification of cognates is sometimes impeded by one or another type of interference or obstacle, as follows.
Etymological investigation is hampered or helped by the investigator's native language and
9
1.4.4 OLD CHINESE AND ETYMOLOGY
culture. A native speaker of Chinese would with little hesitation, and probably correctly, equate ya W 'sprout' with ya ?f 'tooth', while this connection might not be self-evident to speakers of European languages.
The composition of a Chinese character interferes occasionally with the semantic under­ standing of the word behind it (see also § 1.4.2). YU ~ 'leftover, rest' is usually thought to mean originally 'food leftovers' because it is written with the radical sM'to eat'. Yet the radical may have been chosen because concrete food leftovers were easier to represent graphically than the abstraction 'remainder, rest'. Thus' rood leftovers' is merely one semantic extension of the word.
The Chinese writing system is not alphabetic, although a phonetic element in the majority of graphs provides some clue for a word's OC sound. But there is disagreement on some details of DC reconstruction, especially about the initial consonants. Depending on whose OC system one follows, one may arrive at startlingly different etymologies; for example, wei (MC jiwi) 'to be' is reconstructed *rgd by Li Fang Kuei who relates this then to WT red-pa 'to be', but reconstructed *wjij by Baxter, which turns out to be related to PTB *w;'}y 'to be'. OUf investigations are based on Baxter (1992), many uncertain details notwithstanding.
Variant forms are common occurrences in dialects, i.e., Mi B 'colloquial' vs. wen }( 'literary' forms, such as Mandarin col. ta 1iH 'he, she, it' vs. lit. tui) 'other'. These are lexi­ cally two different words but historically one and the same etymon, no ablaut morphology derived one from the other. This phenomenon is so ubiquitous in China that one might expect this to have occurred already in ancient and archaic times.
Subjective judgment slips into etymological consideration easily because of the mono­ syllabic nature of the words (countless words have the syllable structure CV) and the often diffuse and fuzzy field of meanings that Chinese words and graphs have accumulated over millennia. Even when the meaning is specific or when the syllable structure is complex, it is occasionally difficult to decide what is related to what. Two illustrations:
(I) Tau M *d6 'head' agrees exactly with TB-PL *du 'head' (PLB *u = PTB, ST *0). But it agrees equally well with a MK etymon: note Khmer Idool! 'head'; a MK final consonant is often lost in OC after a long vowel, hence the equation is also perfect. Which is related to Chinese? Are both CH and PL descended from MK?
(2) Chiln *srfm or *sren 'to produce' strikes one as the obvious cognate of WT srel-ba 'to raise, bring up'. The Chinese word even has a counterpart with initial *m- in the word miiin frStl *mran 'give birth', thus forming a well-known ST pair *8- (transitive I causative) - *m- (intr.). But then Khmer has a word Isamraall (i.e., *s-m-raal) 'to give birth', derived from rala Irfigl/ 'to inerease, ... distribute, propagate'. On the one hand, Chinese is closely related to Tibeto­ Burman; on the other, Mon-Khmer provides a possible etymology for both OC words, i.e., a root from which the items in question could be derived, while there is no TB counterpart to miiin. Is the Chinese wf ST or AA? Or do both Chinese and WT go back to the same area etymon?
1.4.4 The present approach The present approach to OC etymology tends to diverge from most others in two respects.
First, linguistic givens tend to override graphic representations and their phonological impli- cations when the choice of a phonetic element in a graph is unusual in light of MC and other data. Phonological patterns and changes do normally follow their own immutable rules; but why over 3000 years ago a certain graphic element was chosen to write a certain word was
10
OLD CHINESE AND ETYMOLOGY 1.4.4
up to the whim of a writer (see more in § 12.1.2). Thus zhur1E OCM *tui (OSR 575; OCB *tjuj) 'a bird' was selected to write 'to be' which could have been due to all kinds of mental processes and associations. MCjiwi points to OC *wi 'to be'; PTB *Wgy (or *wi?) 'to be' confirms this. Thus the comparative method as well as MC poin